Are surburban dogs happier than city dogs?
Plus, are dogs racist? And all of our other dog questions answered.
Hey, Devan here.
I’m writing this from my Brooklyn apartment as my dog, Ollie, lies behind me. If you follow me on Instagram, you already know I’m pretty obsessed with Ollie—in a way that’s somewhat embarrassing to admit (God was really in her bag when she invented dogs).
As someone who loves dogs, I was starting to feel guilty—once again—about having Ollie live in the city, especially as I kept coming across TikToks of people moving their dogs to the suburbs for a “better life.” Would my 80-pound dog be happier in a house with a fenced-in backyard? Am I ruining his life just because I want to be a city boy?
So, for this episode, I wanted to tackle a question I’ve been dreading: Are suburban dogs happier than city dogs?
(YouTube, Apple/Spotify/etc. here)
To find out, I spoke with one of the leading dog cognition experts, Alexandra Horowitz. She heads the Dog Cognition Lab at Barnard and is the author of Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know. Importantly for our purposes, she’s also someone who has lived with dogs in both the city and the country. We also tackle questions like: Are those dog breed DNA tests accurate? Are dogs racist? Is Cesar Millan a fraud? And can dogs actually communicate with buttons?
Some helpful links:
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Have feedback for No Such Thing or an idea for a new episode? Send us an email at mannynoahdevan@gmail.com.